Coffee Run
by LittleDragon94
Summary: When you're the newest recruit in the Auror Office, it's your job to go and get the coffee.


It was a typical day at the Auror Office: Nymphadora Tonks had spent most of her time scanning through paperwork, looking for something interesting to take forward to Mad-Eye in the hopes that he would then take her on a raid or investigation. It was tough being an Auror-in-Training, especially when you were the youngest and clumsiest witch to pass the entry tests in recent years.

She was quite relieved when Kingsley stuck his head around the corner of her cubicle and asked if she could get the coffee round.

'Sure thing,' she smiled, grabbing her worn red leather jacket from the back of the chair. Ordinarily, doing the coffee run would have been something Tonks hated to do, but that just showed how awfully bored she was at that moment. Not that she would have gotten out of it anyway; as the newest member of the department she could hardly say no to a senior Auror.

* * *

The lift rattled down the levels of the Ministry of Magic, announcing the departments on each floor in a painfully polite voice. Tonks considered her reflection in the glossy wall of the lift. Scrunching her eyes shut to focus, Tonks felt the familiar tingling running across her scalp. She opened her eyes and smiled: her hair was now a shocking shade of violet.

'Ground floor: Ministry of Magic Atrium,' the lift-voice announced. Tonks slid the lift-grill to the side so she could get out and found herself face to face with a small, toad-like woman in a rather offensive shade of pink.

'Good afternoon Madam Umbridge,' she smiled fixedly, trying to echo the lift's politeness.

Dolores Umbridge eyed Tonks' hair as though it had killed her favourite kitten. 'Good afternoon Nymphadora,' she replied in a clipped tone, stepping into the lift.

Tonks hurried away, her heavy steel-toecap boots squeaking slightly on the tiled floor of the Atrium. She took the pedestrian exit up to Muggle London and stepped from the red telephone box. There was no one about - not that there ever was - hence why the Ministry's public entrance was positioned where it was.

* * *

The coffee shop that the Auror office frequented was a Muggle one, just around the corner from the public entrance. It was a small and cosy place with a few tables placed outside in the hope that the British weather would grant its patrons a sliver of sunlight to enjoy. Tonks had only been to the coffee shop once before (she had managed to get out of the several other times she'd been asked by Mad-Eye announcing that he was going to take Tonks out for some training), but she had the orders memorised like her career depended on it; though knowing Mad-Eye it just might.

She waited in the lunchtime queue, rummaging in her jacket pockets for the Muggle money she kept in there. The queue moved quickly; the barista manning both the till and the coffee machine clearly knew what he was doing and did it very efficiently. As she moved closer, Tonks observed the man's skill - she would have been hopeless behind the counter, scattering coffee beans all over the place, dropping a pot of hot water, probably then slipping on said dropped coffee beans like some sort of Muggle cartoon character.

The man was tall and lean, his uniform shirt neatly pressed with obvious care; the sleeves were rolled down and buttoned, despite how restrictive that must have been while he worked. Tonks wondered why, especially when the other two people working at the coffee shop had their sleeves rolled up past their arms - this guy even had his top button done up. Maybe he had some crazy tattoos he had to hide, Tonks thought, he could be the type, she mused, with his very interesting face; youthful, yet weary, as though his body had aged quickly without his consent. His chestnut hair was cut short, a few strands of his fringe falling just above his eyes. Curiously, he had streaks of grey running through his hair. Tonks couldn't decide if this guy should be a tweed-wearing professor or one of those silver-fox musicians that her mum loved so much. Bizarrely, Tonks couldn't decide which of those she found sexier.

At last, Tonks reached the front of the queue.

'What can I get for you today?' the guy asked with a tired smile. It was only then that Tonks quite noticed his how blue his eyes were; as clichéd as it sounds, they were like oceans. Deep pools of glittering, swirling liquid that Tonks just wanted to dive into.

'Oh, uhm, could I get a skinny Cappuccino with chocolate sprinkles, a cinnamon Mochachino - no cream, a flat white latte - with cream, a milky Americano, double shot Caffe Latte, and an Espresso - short, to take away please?'

The man scribbled down the order in the secretive barista code of acronyms and fuzzy symbols. Tonks handed over payment and stood to the side while the guy turned to the coffee machine. There were still two more customers after Tonks, both glaring at her for daring to have a large coffee order. Gorgeous-eye-guy turned back to Tonks:

'It'll take a few minutes to get these ready for you. If you want to take a seat I can call you up when they're done?' His voice had a rich quality to it. Tonks could happily listen to him talk for hours.

'No, thank you, I'll wait here.' Mad-Eye was adamant that Tonks should watch every part of the coffee making process to ensure that no one poisoned his beverage. Regardless of whether she watched it or not, he was sure to go through his whole regime of testing his coffee for poisons before declaring it safe to drink, by which time the coffee was stone cold. Yet Tonks also wouldn't put it past Mad-Eye to be watching her every move at the coffee shop, so she'd better stay put and watch the damn coffee being made. Not that she particularly minded, after all it meant that she could watch eye-guy work his coffee magic.

As he served his last two customers (both of whom had quick and simple orders) while waiting for the water to steam, Tonks found herself watching his hands as they confidently manoeuvred their way around the coffee machine, refilling it and detaching sections to heat and blend the coffee.

If Mad-Eye had, in fact, been watching Tonks then she would certainly have failed his test: she had completely lost focus on the coffee and was unashamedly ogling the baristas every move.

When he reached up to a high shelf for a new can of cream, his smartly tucked in shirt pulled itself free of his belt, revealing a tantalising view of an unexpectedly toned stomach and a dark trail of hair leading to his trousers. Tonks' mouth dropped open a fraction.

'Order up!' he smiled, depositing six plastic cups in two cardboard trays on the counter.

It took Tonks a moment to realise that he was talking to her. 'Could I get these in a box please?' she asked apologetically. 'I'll probably end up dropping these otherwise.'

'No problem,' he had dimples on his cheeks when he smiled. He reached under the counter for an easy fold-out box. Tonks quickly averted her gaze to the ceiling in case he caught her admiring his arse in the reflective cupboard behind him. Evidently, it had been far too long since Tonks had got any action; she hadn't even been out with a guy since Charlie had left for Romania, and that parting hadn't exactly been as smooth as she had hoped.

'Is that everything?' the guy asked, sliding the box across the counter to her.

'That's perfect, thanks,' she smiled, hoping that she wasn't blushing. Her eyes flicked to his name badge, which she had been rather too distracted to notice before. Remus. An unusual name.

Tonks picked up the box and strode confidently out of the coffee shop, only stumbling when she caught her toe on an uneven spot of pavement outside. Determined not to look back to see if Remus had seen her trip, Tonks carried on, keeping her mind focused on safely transporting her charge back to the Auror Office without mishap.

* * *

'Skinny Cappuccino with sprinkles for Kingsley,' Tonks announced, delivering the coffees around the office.

'Mmmmm,' Kingsley inhaled the aroma of his coffee.

'Flat white with cream, sir,' she deposited the second coffee onto Rufus Scrimgeour's desk (he looked busy writing something important). 'Milk disguised as coffee for Dawlish,' she placed the Americano down on the desk in the empty cubicle opposite hers. 'Double shot latte,' that was for Robards, 'cinnamon Mochachino for me, and a short Espresso for Moody.'

The grizzled Auror's magical eye whirred in its socket, watching the coffee as Tonks set it down on his desk. 'Did you watch it being made?'

'Yes I did,' Tonks rolled her eyes, 'I stood there and watched his every move.' Well, she had.

Moody grunted, pulling his poison detecting kit from a desk drawer.

'If you do that to all the coffees I go and get, someday I'm going to stop getting you anything,' she warned.

Moody barked a laugh, knowing that she wouldn't follow through on that threat. 'In that case you can get the coffees in tomorrow too.'

Tonks groaned, except she didn't feel particularly hard done by at all.

Merlin's beard, she thought to herself, I need to get laid.

* * *

_**Coffee shop AUs are just so nice to write. What do you think?**_


End file.
